Have you guessed by now that I'm a bit driven? I come by that naturally, but that's a story for another day, for sure.
April was almost over and my adventure for the month hadn't happened yet. And my week-end was going to be spent visiting friends 5 hours away from home. Maybe I could just skip a month,
I thought to myself. What harm would it be, my evil genie rasped into my ear? This second year of exploration is really icing on the cake of anticipation that the whole experience has added to my life, anyway.
I couldn' t skip it. I simply had to fulfill my monthly obligation, even if that obligation is to myself. But how to do that at this late date? One lesson I've learned is that I cannot rely on others to accomplish this event for me. It's not that they set out to disappoint me or tie a knot in my plans. They simply don't have any personal stake in this journey of mine.Plans had been laid earlier in the month for another adventure that I have never tackled, but those plans rested on the shoulders of other people who couldn't follow through. Aging has taught me many things, one of which is to take control of my own destiny. Blaming others is a reflection of immaturity.
So, I swallowed my reticence about this exercise phenomenon called ZUMBA and stepped into Studio 1 at my gym last Friday evening, thinking I could blend into the crowd of exuberant women in the back of the room who were sweating and dancing to Latin music.
You know what they say about the best laid plans, right? There were three of us in the class. That's right.....and I was the newbie in the group standing adrift in the center of the floor of this very large exercise studio. Alone. Highly visible. And very uncomfortable. The music started and the young instructor started jumping and dancing and making strange "yipping" sounds that actually meant something to the group. Well, everyone but me, of course. I tried to keep up with the intricate steps, even the one set of movements where we wore belly dance scarves around our hips, sashaying from one end of the gleaming floor to the other, with mirrors mocking me 360 degrees around the room. Oh, joy.....I would say some trite word like "cute," those scarves with the shiny silver and gold disks sewn all over them, but by this time I was panting and dripping sweat into my eyes and onto that highly varnished floor. Cute, it was not.
But, I have to admit that it WAS fun. I was able to keep up with my two classmates and my dance lessons for the past year helped with catching on to some of the patterns, too.
I fulfilled my self-imposed obligation to experience something new each month, and I may have found a new class to add to my exercise regimen. Compulsiveness pays off sometimes. And the genie loses again.
PS....It was one year ago this weekend that I walked into a dance studio to take ONE ballroom dance lesson as my "new thing" for that month. Most of you know that result of that: I found a joy that I had never experienced previously, and a hobby that is the most fun I have ever had, although it challenges me every minute I am in class. My instructor taught me that I do not have to be perfect all the time and that I can actually stop thinking every once in a while and just move. I am ever grateful.
April was almost over and my adventure for the month hadn't happened yet. And my week-end was going to be spent visiting friends 5 hours away from home. Maybe I could just skip a month,
I thought to myself. What harm would it be, my evil genie rasped into my ear? This second year of exploration is really icing on the cake of anticipation that the whole experience has added to my life, anyway.
I couldn' t skip it. I simply had to fulfill my monthly obligation, even if that obligation is to myself. But how to do that at this late date? One lesson I've learned is that I cannot rely on others to accomplish this event for me. It's not that they set out to disappoint me or tie a knot in my plans. They simply don't have any personal stake in this journey of mine.Plans had been laid earlier in the month for another adventure that I have never tackled, but those plans rested on the shoulders of other people who couldn't follow through. Aging has taught me many things, one of which is to take control of my own destiny. Blaming others is a reflection of immaturity.
So, I swallowed my reticence about this exercise phenomenon called ZUMBA and stepped into Studio 1 at my gym last Friday evening, thinking I could blend into the crowd of exuberant women in the back of the room who were sweating and dancing to Latin music.
You know what they say about the best laid plans, right? There were three of us in the class. That's right.....and I was the newbie in the group standing adrift in the center of the floor of this very large exercise studio. Alone. Highly visible. And very uncomfortable. The music started and the young instructor started jumping and dancing and making strange "yipping" sounds that actually meant something to the group. Well, everyone but me, of course. I tried to keep up with the intricate steps, even the one set of movements where we wore belly dance scarves around our hips, sashaying from one end of the gleaming floor to the other, with mirrors mocking me 360 degrees around the room. Oh, joy.....I would say some trite word like "cute," those scarves with the shiny silver and gold disks sewn all over them, but by this time I was panting and dripping sweat into my eyes and onto that highly varnished floor. Cute, it was not.
But, I have to admit that it WAS fun. I was able to keep up with my two classmates and my dance lessons for the past year helped with catching on to some of the patterns, too.
I fulfilled my self-imposed obligation to experience something new each month, and I may have found a new class to add to my exercise regimen. Compulsiveness pays off sometimes. And the genie loses again.
PS....It was one year ago this weekend that I walked into a dance studio to take ONE ballroom dance lesson as my "new thing" for that month. Most of you know that result of that: I found a joy that I had never experienced previously, and a hobby that is the most fun I have ever had, although it challenges me every minute I am in class. My instructor taught me that I do not have to be perfect all the time and that I can actually stop thinking every once in a while and just move. I am ever grateful.
People need to be made more aware of the need to work
at learning how to live because life is so quick and sometimes it goes
away too quickly.
Andy Warhol
No comments:
Post a Comment